


Dreamless

by feliciacraft



Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Genre: Action, Depression, F/M, Happy Ending, Monster of the Week, Romance, Season/Series 06
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-25
Updated: 2017-09-26
Packaged: 2018-11-04 16:51:52
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 9,541
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10995006
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/feliciacraft/pseuds/feliciacraft
Summary: Buffy woke up the same way she always did these days, a blank alertness overtaking sleep, without the harsh interjection of an alarm clock whisking her into action, without the dying whispers of a dream urging her to stay. Neither sudden nor gradual, instead it felt inevitable — like birth; yet always decidedly out of place. What was life after death in a nutshell, if not that?(Early season 6 AU story with a canon opening and a happy Spuffy ending.)





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Though I wrote this as a story of hope (and believe it is), please note trigger warning for depression and suicide ideation. This story is rated a solid R.
> 
> My deepest thanks to the amazing beta team consisting of All4Spike, darkheartwalsh, il_mio_capitano, freecat15, and rahirah, who went above and beyond the duties of beta readers, helped me reality check sensitive content and pushed me to break through my comfort zone as a writer. Thank you!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Minor edits posted on 9/24/2017.

She woke up the same way she always did these days: a blank alertness overtaking sleep, without the harsh interjection of an alarm clock whisking her into action, without the dying whispers of a dream urging her to stay. Neither sudden nor gradual, instead it felt inevitable — like birth; yet always decidedly out of place. What was life after death in a nutshell, if not that?

She’d open her eyes to stare at the ceiling without comprehension, until the surroundings eventually registered as her bed, her room, her house. But it was someone else’s life she was living now — got to be, because she’d lived her own already, tried so hard, did her best, and drawn to a close with what she’d hoped was a valiant ending. Was it not enough?

No dreams. Not anymore. It was like…time stopped as soon as she closed her eyes, and waited for them to open again before resuming. In between, there was only space. Empty and vast and still and hard to navigate. Not unlike life itself. 

She no longer held out hope that one day, she’d open her eyes to find herself back in her own life. (Did she mean...her own death?) No, this was a different kind of miracle. The kind that she didn’t ask for. The kind that fulfilled someone else’s wish against her will, at her expense.

She turned to the blank wall, a sheet of textured seafoam green paint  — chosen by the previous owner of the house, projecting fake serenity — and closed her eyes again.

* * *

The sun was hovering low on the horizon when she finally got up, got dressed. Flipping to a nocturnal life had been a genius move, her schedule now synched to that of her namesake enemies. All slay and no play was not so much of a problem once avoiding her friends became her number one objective.

For days, they’d been trying to coax her out of her room while the sun ruled the sky. Any time her well-being was brought into question, she’d simply reply, “Tired,” with a smile as thin as her excuse. Not exactly lying but definitely not volunteering the whole truth either. Then, shutting her bedroom door on the world outside, she’d smooth out the corners of her new blackout curtains, and retreat back into the cocoon of her bed.

What did she have to look forward to? She was on repeat. Stuck. Her whole life a Groundhog Day farce. Just a series of fights to the death, a desperate attempt at keeping the advances of darkness at bay, an endless effort to save her loved ones and innocent strangers alike. Tough choices, lose-lose situations, high prices to pay for her so-called victories. From the manicured clutches of a hell god she’d managed to save Dawn, but Mom she’d lost to the shadow.

Was it any wonder that she couldn’t muster up the energy to care? Slipping out her window and sliding down the roof to land near Mom’s rosebush, all leaves and flowerless now that it’d lost its  caretaker , Buffy kicked off yet another day with routine patrol — the one thing that she (still) did these days that passed for “normal” in the Scoobies’ eyes. She had to get out of the house before she screamed.

It wasn’t until she found herself within the confines of Restfield Cemetery that she noticed her exit from the hustle and bustle of Sunnydale suburbia. Beyond the wrought iron gate in the land of the living normal people thrived, progressed, celebrated, sipping life’s sweet nectar from a common spring somehow denied to her. Here, fenced in with the gloom and doom, in the company of only the dearly departed, and the newly-minted evil undead yet to rise, Buffy still managed to be the odd one out. Therein lay the rub, the real clincher in the Slayer’s curse: always alone, forever the misfit, in life as in death. Even, in her case, extending to life after death.

But why had she come to Restfield Cemetery? Here and there a tree laden with out-of-season blossoms failed to lift her spirits, and only served to irritate her more. Stupid Hellmouth weather, full of false spring-like cheer in the height of autumn. Of all the hunting grounds in Sunnydale, was it mere coincidence that she found herself, once again, practically at the door of the only Undead she was supposed to live and, well, let unlive? She looked down at her stylish ankle boots with reinforced pointy toe boxes, perfect for delivering extra painful kicks, and admonished, “Bad feet. Lead me here of all places. See if I put you on autopilot again.”

Her cheeks burned at the thought of the bleached blond vampire, a fellow outcast. The bane of her existence for longer than any demon should have the right to be against a Slayer, when did he cross the great divide from archenemy to steadfast ally? When did her attitude towards him shift from seething hate and major annoyance to mild intrigue and begrudging admiration? When did she start thinking about his eyes, his freakishly long tongue, the way he seemed bursting at the seams with life, his lithe, toned body full of power and pressed against — 

And could she stop thinking about him already?

Desperate to yank her mind back on track to duty and world saving and evil stoppage, she searched the ground for signs of freshly turned soil, and arrived at a pair of gleaming tombstones flanked by lovely bouquets of white lilies. Reading the names on the tombstones didn’t ring a bell, and she let out a small sigh of relief. Should they rise as fledges, Buffy would be spared of the whole awkwardness involved in staking former acquaintances. Less unnecessary trauma all around.

Now where were the vampires when she needed a good slay? A bitter laugh escaped from her lips over the decided lack of demonic activity. It was enough that, at home, she was given a wide berth, treated with kid gloves, molly-coddled. What, now even the vamps were in on it? Nowadays so much was done _for_ her, _in her consideration_ , without _including_ her. As if she had a terminal condition and wasn’t long for this world. ( _As if it weren’t the opposite._ ) Or as if she were a spoiled child: her judgement to be questioned, but her whims indulged, by all who’d agreed to do the best for her according to _their_ definition of “best”.

A piercing shriek cut short Buffy’s train of thought, and unable to spot the threat with a quick survey, she dived for cover behind a nearby tree, and witnessed, from her relative safety, one of the new tombstones crushed to smithereens beneath an enormous claw. The impact sent tremors up the tree trunk, peppering Buffy with fallen petals of the palest pink.

It would’ve been pretty if she weren’t focused on the oversized claw that’d inflicted that damage. She must’ve wished a little too hard for monsters.

Jumping to her feet, Buffy blurted out the first thing that came to her, “Hey! Show a little respect for the dead!” It felt good to finally get that out of her system. (Although since her friends hadn’t managed that, why would she expect it of demons?) Seeing the monster drawing up to its full height and the dismissal in its return gaze almost made her regret speaking up.

Because as demons went, this one definitely belonged in the heavy-weight class, easily twice her height, wide as an SUV, and built like one, too — if SUVs were like bulky bipedal crocodiles and pointy all over: with lethal-looking claws, a protruding jaw crowded with sharp teeth, and a spiked tail. To Buffy’s advantage, it also suffered the turn radius of an SUV: as its body changed course in a sudden left turn to come at her, its tail demolished everything in its wake with a wide, oblivious sweep. On second thought, maybe that should count as more of the bad, too.

A firm believer of striking first and striking hard, she rushed the demon, swinging her fists as high as she could reach, unleashing their momentum on its scaled...belly? So the height disadvantage was totally going to suck, but she’d never let it stop her before.

“I’m Buffy the Vampire Slayer!” she shouted in between swings, “and you are —” The beast roared again, and Buffy held her breath against the stench. “Ugh, you’re in need of a breath mint!”

Proving that it was no fan of small talk, the giant lizard didn’t even bother with a retort. It swiped at Buffy with the boredom of someone dismissing an annoying but harmless gnat. And as she skidded to a stop, crashing head-first into a gravemarker some fifteen feet away, unflatteringly spread-eagled and face down, she begrudgingly acknowledged the stinky beast’s superior strength.

“Ow.” She spat out dirt and wiped her face on her sleeve, limping to her feet. “That was _not_ dignified!” Though, remarkably, as she mentally inventoried her vital organs, light on the damage scale. The lone casualty from her first round? Not counting her pride in tatters, one last season’s blouse which Buffy concurred with the beast that it had outlived the trend.

Oddly, Lizard Face seemed to have forgotten about her and found a diversion in digging. Or maybe it’d always been a sandcastle enthusiast? A treasure hunter? Certainly not a tunnel-borer judging by its size.  Picking up a fallen tree branch as a makeshift lance that extended her reach , she approached the beast from the side on silent steps, tracking the repetitive motion of the scaly arms, the reflexive twitch and thump of a spiked tail.

Expecting an attack, she was caught entirely off guard when Lizard Face dragged a coffin out of the earth, pried open its protective shell like an oyster, and — _oh God no_ — slurped its contents in one fluid motion, fabric and all. And there it was, the mystery solved: This encounter had not been about a demon challenging a Slayer. This had been, simply, a scavenger looking for an easy meal.

Buffy’s knees buckled as the sickening crunch reached her ears, and gagging, she found herself on all fours, desperately trying to unsee —

_ — the body, already decomposing, limp and light, like a rag doll — _

It was a thought she’d resisted, relegated to the dark recesses of her mind but now could no longer repress: had she looked like that, laid to rest six feet under, in the company of worms, after life had departed and nature taken over? How much of _her_ had seeped into the ground, evaporated into the atmosphere, absorbed by blue myrtles and weeping willows? And the magical restoration that’d brought her back — had _all_ of her returned, reassembled from cuttings of overgrown cemetery greenery, her soul recalled from —

She bit her tongue to stop the word from escaping, until the taste of copper flooded her mouth. It was all of _it_ she had left, all that she could hold onto: a name, wisps of memory. Fingernails digging into the earth, knees numb from the weight of her own physical existence, she saw her face superimposed onto that of the ragdoll and thought that she might never be able to look into a mirror again.

All because of the creature before her. Pain and rage compelled Buffy to her feet, swift and decisive as she ran toward the monster. Swinging the silvery tree branch up to a nice forward momentum, she aimed for the soft hide of the quivering chin and —

— faltered, the tip of her makeshift weapon spearing into the ground after making a wide arc.

An idea popped into her head, crystal-clear as if etched on a grave marker, and froze her to the spot. _It’d be so easy_ , a treacherous voice whispered in the back of her head, _to simply — let it happen_. But of course! A super-sized, carnivorous demon made an ideal candidate: given the size of her opponent, who could blame her for losing? And if there was no body, then there would be nothing for Willow to resurrect. Her final rest would at last go on uninterrupted, in eternal peace.

Wouldn't that be nice? She was just so _tired_. Resolutely, without a shred of regard for this wretched world that could risk her turning into a pillar of salt, she closed her eyes.

(To be continued...)


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Minor edits posted on 9/24/2017.

When the roar came — urgent, raw, reverberating through her body — she remained still, undaunted. She waited for it, the final agony before oblivion, the price for peace. Her heart raced, her body screamed to defend itself, but she wanted to go without a struggle; she wanted her last moment on this earth to be dignified.

“What the bloody hell’s the matter with you?”

The lizard spoke English?

Her eyes snapped open to the sight of a dark and leathery lump hurled into the same broken tree that’d saved her earlier, triggering another explosion of white-and-pink petals. The lump stumbled to its feet, and suddenly, she locked gazes with a pair of familiar amber eyes, their intensity threatening to overload her fight-or-flight instinct.

“Spike?”

“One and the same,” he snarled in a thick voice, and wiped at a gash across his forehead with the back of his hand, smearing blood all over his bumpies. “Now snap out of it, Slayer!” — He tossed her a sword — “And gimme a hand!” Then he jumped back into the fray.

Her face hot with shame, she feigned outrage. “Hey! I was handling it! Find your own giant lizard!”

“Believe me,” he grunted out and, with a two-handed swing, buried a battle axe in the monster’s armoured back. Using it as leverage to climb onto its shoulders, he shot back, “If you’d been ‘handling it’ I wouldn’t’ve intervened!”

Incredibly, he was trying to put the monster into a chokehold, which probably would’ve worked better if the creature’s immense neck would fit into the crook of his elbow.

“I was…strategizing! Searching for weakness!” She covered, leaping out of the way as Spike was thrown bodily from the monster’s back.

“This ain’t sodding chess, Slayer! Hop to it!” With difficulty, he peeled himself off the ground, not even bothering to dust off the old leather before making another bone-headed attempt to — was he really trying to wrestle with the beast?

The only thing worse than losing a battle was watching someone else lose it, while knowing exactly what she would do differently, how she would win. Standing on the sidelines while Spike teased more than fought the demon was unbearable. Buffy gave the sword a practice swing. Comfortable grip, good balance, oiled blade, sharpened edge; it would do.

Looked like she was going to save his hide — again.

Unless…

He wouldn’t purposely throw a fight just to spur her into action, would he? Lay his unlife on the line because he figured that in the mind of Buffy Anne Summers, he was more than capable of committing such blunders on the battlefield? This, after all the times he’d proven to be a formidable opponent? What did he take her for, someone who’d never dropped out of college Psych 101 because her professor got skewered by her own bio-mechanical demonoid Frankenstein? (And by the way, that bitch so deserved it!)

Take now, for example. Spike had somehow fallen into the monster’s grip, pounding and kicking to no avail.

Exasperated, she yelled, “Where’s your axe?”

“Not…here…” he said lamely.

“Ugh!” Seriously, she had zero patience for headgames. If she was going to live through tonight, and it looked like she was headed in that direction, she might as well come out on top.

She swung the sword up and over her shoulder like a baseball bat, a powerful starting position. After aiming for the popliteus muscle stretched thin in the back of one of the monster’s knees, she brought the sword down with a decisive stroke. The beast screeched, the wounded knee crashing to the ground. Both claws rushed to staunch the flow of — _yuck_ — green demon blood.

She pulled a slightly dazed Spike up to his feet and safety.

He shook his head as if to clear it. “Ta, Slayer.”

“OK, time to talk strategy.” She kept an eye on the monster. On the lizard’s back, bowed low enough to permit Buffy a glimpse, something glistened.

“Wait a minute…” she muttered. There, jammed between two plates of armour, was Spike’s battleaxe. And with a running start, a step and a leap, followed by a hard wrench, Buffy wriggled the hefty weapon free.

“Was stuck,” grumbled Spike, when Buffy handed it over.

Buffy snickered. “Was _not_.”

Spike’s next words were drowned out by the anguished wail of the giant lizard gingerly getting back up. Buffy cut him short.

“Listen to me. This thing’s big, but nimble it is not. It’ll have trouble keeping track of both of us — that’s how we’ll take it down. You handle the squishy front, and I’ll attack it from the back. Be light on your feet and ready to move. Oh, and watch out for that wrecking ball of a tail. Deal?”

He gripped the axe tighter and nodded, eyes glowing with admiration. “You’re hot when you’re in charge…”

She rolled her eyes, unable to stop a smirk from spreading — vampires, not clear on the time and a place thing — and gave him a play-shove. “Go!”

New positions assumed, they fought in tandem, and soon found a rhythm. Attack and retreat and reposition, alternating between offense and defense. With complementary moves choreographed to kill, they turned the battle into a beautiful but lethal dance, the beast trapped between them. Until finally, separating the two dancers no more, it collapsed upon the ground, a ghastly swan song emanating from its throat.

Triumphant but covered similarly from head to toe in blood and demon goo, Buffy and Spike took one look at each other and burst into laughter. In good company and good cheer, the voices from the abyss of her mind ceased; in their place a victory song surged. Gasping for breath, delirious from exhaustion but also from something akin to happiness, Buffy had one thought above all:

She could’ve danced all night.

(To be continued...)


	3. Chapter 3

Buffy hadn’t wanted to come home, Spike in tow. Give him a front-row seat to the dark underbelly of her unexamined life so that he could strip her of the pretense that she’d been “handling” anything. Invite him in where the thin layer of dust on weapons stacked neatly in the workout area might betray her neglect of training. Where the leaning tower of unopened mail on her dresser, mostly bills, would expose her as an unqualified head of household. Where Dawn’s surprise and delight to see her sister at all would point the finger of judgement firmly at her as the absentee parent. Where Willow’s half-longing, half-accusatory looks directed at the back of her head might reveal too much about her estrangement from her friends.

Where, if he truly looked, with his freaky-sensitive vampire vision and annoyingly keen perception, and took it all in, he’d be able to deduce the depths of her despair.

In the end, however, even she couldn’t refute the wisdom of a hot shower and a fresh change of clothes. No less a creature of the night than he was by now, she could always…slip away into the darkness. So to Revello Drive they returned, finding — as Buffy had hoped — the house in a hushed silence, its occupants already asleep.

She showered thoroughly but efficiently. Washing demon goo out of her hair proved easier than purging from her head thoughts about a certain platinum blond demon that made her blush, so she trained her focus on the simple tasks at hand, the solid objects each owning a clear purpose. Lathering, scrubbing, rinsing. Slippery hands gliding over supple flesh. Soap bubbles tracing every peak and valley. _Not_ thinking of the bloodsucker. (Dammit.) Toweling off. Getting dressed. Jeans that stretched over her curves like a glove. The tank top with spaghetti straps that kissed her shoulders. Not. Thinking.

Her bedroom was empty, but the thin drift of smoke rising just outside her window gave Spike away. There he was, lounging on the roof, gazing into the night as Buffy had so often done. Did he stumble upon her favorite spot by accident, drawn to it without knowing why? She shook her head to clear away the silly notion. More likely, it was some gross predator thing based on her lingering scent.

And, oh. Unbothered by the chilly night air, he’d taken off his Doc Martens and socks and left them somewhere, and rolled up the hems of his stained jeans into cuffs. She studied his bare, crossed ankles, his slender, manicured feet, the black nail enamel chipped just so. Unable to look away. Unable to reconcile this unguarded moment with her mental image of him. She’d never seen Spike, self-proclaimed Big Bad, without his over-the-top, punk combat boots. Nevermind that it was her house, catching him in this casual state of undress somehow felt like an invasion of his privacy.

A breeze lifted up a few tendrils of her still-damp hair, and she shivered. She must remember to grab a jacket before slipping out of the house later.

Spike’s blood-splattered jeans, though, couldn’t wait any longer. Rummaging in the back of her closet produced a decidedly unsexy combination: a pair of sweatpants and a large t-shirt with fold lines so deep that they intertwined with the fabric pattern. Xander must’ve left them behind from one of the countless repair jobs he’d done on the house. She marched to the window and presented the Xander combo to him.  
  
“Your turn.”  
  
“Thanks ever so.” He stubbed out his cigarette, and grabbed the proffered change of clothes, letting his fingers brush against hers in the process.  
  
Buffy’s fingertips tingled, and she tucked them under folded arms. The air between them buzzed with electricity, the silence suddenly turned uncomfortable. Her mind went blank on what to do, what to say. Should she make a joke about, once again, sneaking a vampire up to her room? Would that be weird? Best keep her mouth shut. Awkwardly, she watched him pad softly to the bathroom.

At the door, he turned to her, shot a quick glance to the open window, uncertainty in his eyes.

“You’ll wait, won’t you?”

So he’d caught onto her MO of slipping out unnoticed ahead of any anticipated heart-to-heart.

She flashed him a smile, feigning lightheartedness. “Well, it’s my room, my house. I’ll guard your spot on the roof, okay?”

“All right,” he said, even though his face was painted with worry. “Won’t be a mo.” With one last look at her, he rushed into the bathroom.

Buffy heard the door click shut, and perched herself on the windowsill.

She’d expected him to come to her sooner, wanting to talk. In a way, she wished he had. Ever since she’d let slip to him that the resurrection spell had torn her out of Heaven, she’d been terrified that he’d betray her trust and spill the beans to her friends. Hold it over their heads that he’d somehow made it into the Slayer’s inner circle, _more_ inner even than them, like a secret bosom friend. Or worse, use it as leverage to drag her into the darkness with him, an entirely different kind of secret bosom friend, thus kicking off a downward spiral of _dirtybadwrong_ that some part of her _might_ just enjoy…

Suddenly the thought of a naked Spike on the other side of the bathroom door, not twenty feet away, overwhelmed her. Eyes firmly on the exit, she crossed the room in a few strides and was about to shout to Spike to find her downstairs when Dawn pushed in.

“OK, spill,” said Dawn without preamble, a too-adult smirk on a too-alert face. “Those are definitely Spike’s boots in the hallway, so where —” She tilted her head in a moment of concentration, then gasped with exaggerated scandal, “Is he _in the shower_?”

There had been a time when, keeping her Slayer status a secret from her mother, Buffy could look her in the eye while lying through her teeth, fabricating on the spot new justifications for her repeated absences, stained clothes, cuts and bruises all over her body. Even succeeded in concealing, at least until Angelus surfaced, her entire relationship with Angel.

Yet now… Every effort was a drain. Every social interaction a bother. And relaying facts concerning a certain member of the Undead flustered her. “He, well, what happened was…” Why couldn’t she get words out? She sighed in frustration and reached for her sister’s hand. “You know what? I’m not even going to dignify that with a response. Let’s get you back to bed, missy.”

Maybe it was Buffy’s hushed tone and averting eyes, but Dawn seemed to sense that she’d gotten the upper hand.

“Nuh-uh” — she tugged Buffy towards the stairs instead — “I haven’t seen you for, like, days. Let’s hang.”

“Shhh!” With her feet on two different stairs, Buffy glanced back at the master bedroom door. “Are you _trying_ to wake up the whole house?”

The way Dawn’s eyes instantly lit up made Buffy want to kick herself. She’d fallen victim to one of the classic blunders of sisterly negotiations: never reveal your weakness. She sighed, “All right, ten minutes.”

As if on cue, the door in question creaked open, and Willow poked her head into the hallway. Eyes squinting in the overhead light, voice thick with sleep, she mumbled, “Dawnie, will you keep it down?”  
  
Then Willow’s eyes zeroed in on Buffy. “Buffy! You’re…” — Alive? Home? Here, among people she usually avoided? — “hurt!”

“I’ll take care of it,” Dawn shot back, with the seasoned boredom befitting the Slayer’s little sister. She tugged Buffy’s arm and together they took another step away from Willow.

Buffy forced out a smile. “Yeah, go back to sleep, Willow. It’s no big —”

“Nonsense! Let’s patch you up!” From groggy to bossy in a split second, Willow darted out of her room, her nightgown billowing slightly in the rush. With one hand on each shoulder, she shepherded the two sisters down to the living room.

After sitting Buffy down on the couch, Willow lifted up Buffy’s elbow to get a better look at the gash that encircled her upper arm, almost appearing gleeful to finally have a solvable problem on her hands.

“Okay, Dawnie, get the first aid kit, will ya?” Willow tossed the line of instruction to Dawn without bothering to look up.

“Sure, order me around in my own house,” Dawn grumbled and stomped the round trip like a disgruntled elephant.

The sound of a crash overhead was followed by the rush of quick feet descending the stairs.

Buffy spoke up, “Oh, that’s just —”

“Melodramatic vampire with separation anxiety,” Dawn finished for her, snickering.

“Huh?” Confused, Willow whipped around and started muttering something under her breath, raising a hand ready to strike.

Buffy grabbed her wrist. “Hey, whoa, easy, Willow.”

It took only a moment for Willow to identify the figure as he drew closer. Incredulous, she stumbled over the impossible name, “S- Spike? Wha…?”

Willow looked him up and down, seemingly bewildered at his ridiculous getup. Or rather, his lack-of-getup: bath towel slung around his neck, wet hair plastered to his forehead, and a pair of too-large sweatpants hanging low on his hips. Dawn stared so hard her eyes bulged like those of a pug. From the open first aid kit she held, a roll of bandage slipped unnoticed to the floor, and unraveled like a ribbon.

Buffy opened her mouth to speak, but oh! Beads of water, delicate, glistening, glided down Spike’s smooth, bare chest, one devoid of the t-shirt she’d given him. Well, she was pretty sure there had been a t-shirt. She couldn’t recall what color.

He reached for her, an open hand ghosting her shoulder before withdrawing, as if bouncing off an invisible barrier. “Buffy! I thought you’d…”

His voice quivered, his chest rising and falling with uneven gasps for air, which proved too much for the water droplets that were hanging on to his smooth skin for dear life. They traced the outline of his abs, and the ones that survived the obstacle of his navel rushed toward the hem of his pants with increased momentum, and —

Buffy jerked her eyes up. “I — I’m here.”

Spike noticeably relaxed at hearing her voice, even if, as conversations went, it wasn’t much of an exchange. Buffy stole glances at Willow and Dawn in turn, who were both watching this new development with rapt attention, and in Willow’s case, a glimmer of something unreadable.

Only then did he seem to notice the other two pairs of eyes on him. “Uh…hello,” he said, self-consciously running a hand through his hair, shedding tiny droplets of water everywhere.

With a snort, Dawn blurted out, “What _ever_ happened to your clothes?”

“Ah, well.” Clearly recovered, Spike swaggered to the couch. With a nod to Willow and a wink to Buffy — turning his head just enough to hide it from everyone else — he plopped down in the center. Draping his arms casually over the back of the couch, he seemed perfectly at ease soaking up the female attention. Without a shirt. Buffy’s cheeks burned and she tried to think repulsive thoughts. Chewed up gum stuck to her shoe. Mystery meat from her high school cafeteria.

Spike cleared his throat and said, “It’s a tale of valor and —”

“Demon guts,” Buffy cut him off. “Of the radioactive green variety. Wanna see?”

Dawn made a face. “Eh, pass.”

Willow had been squeezing out a generous amount of what looked like antiseptic ointment from a plastic tube. Now her brows knitted together in concentration. “A hemocyanin-based life form? Do you know what kind of demon it was?”

“Definitely the bad kind,” said Buffy. “Also dead.”

The plastic shell sputtered between Willow’s fingers, having given up all its gooey content. It was unclear whether Willow heard her, because Willow’s next words were, “Hey, here’s an idea. Want me to gather up the Scooby Gang for another of our research parties?” She rubbed the ointment on Buffy’s arm. It stung.

“Willow, it’s okay. It’s dead. It’s finished.” Just to make it crystal clear, she added, “So, no.”

“You sure? It’d be just like old times.” Willow finished bandaging Buffy’s arm, then stood back to admire her handiwork. “See? All better now!”

All better. Buffy flexed her arm and caught sight of the neat bow, its gauzy wings translucent like a moth’s in the incandescent light. So very high-school Willow. It was also total overkill, dressing such a minor wound. It’d already closed. Probably wouldn’t even leave a scar. Because this miraculous body of hers excelled at healing, erasing all past evidence of injury and injustice. Even death turned out to be nothing more than a flesh wound. Recoverable. Promptly forgotten by everyone else. All better now.

Not getting the response she wanted, Willow appealed to the rest of the group. “Dawnie, research party?”

Dawn tossed a pair of scissors and the remaining roll of bandage back into the first aid kit, then evened out its contents with a loud shake in order to force the lid shut. _Clank shuffle clank click._ “Meh. Doesn’t sound like a demon emergency. Maybe Buffy would rather take me to the mall, _just the two of us_.”

Undeterred, Willow turned to Spike. “OK, I’ve never known _you_ to turn down a party.”

There was a pause during which Buffy pointedly refused to meet Spike’s eyes. If Willow & Co. wanted to create a unified front pretending everything was “just like old times”, they’d have to do so without her participation. The truth wasn’t much, but it was all Buffy had.

Spike got to his feet. “Right. Think my coat’s missing me upstairs.”

“This part feels familiar, too,” Willow said flatly. “Leaving me to do the heavy lifting all by myself.”

Dawn mumbled, “Should work out fine, then, since you like taking charge.”

Buffy stared at the vacated seat on the couch, the cushion rising slowly now that it’d been freed from under Spike’s weight. Mom had downsized after the divorce and prior to their move to the smaller house in Sunnydale from L.A., but this couch, a centerpiece from their previous house, had made the cut. How much had it witnessed over the years!

Good thing furniture wasn’t known to write memoirs.

_(To be continued...)_


	4. Chapter 4

The night wouldn’t end, when all Buffy wanted was to be left alone. It took an eternity for Dawn to be convinced to go back to bed. Disappointed and sulking, she only left after realizing that Willow wasn’t going to let her have Buffy to herself tonight. As for Willow, after getting repeatedly shut down on conversation starters, her glow from having outlasted Dawn eventually faded. Finally, with a frustrated sigh, she too, admitted defeat and withdrew upstairs.

Alone at last, Buffy and Spike positioned themselves across the kitchen counter. For a late-night snack that double-dutied as a delaying tactic, Buffy scooped out a big bowl of ice cream. She opted for a stiff barstool, hoping the lack of a comfy back would help to keep her on her toes, so to speak. Spike, apparently too worked up to sit, folded his arms across his (now tshirt-covered) chest and leaned against the stainless steel fridge, his somber expression unregistered in its surface.

Her bowl of double-chocolate rocky road had now reached that perfect degree of meltiness, stretchy like taffy, malleable, suggestible. Like it wanted to be smeared on and drizzled over tight lean muscle — belonging to nobody in particular — and slowly, thoroughly licked off.

She let go of her spoon, resenting the unhelpful ice cream for inspiring inappropriate thoughts. It seemed implausible, contradictory, mind-boggling, and _depraved_ — even to her — to simultaneously find a flatline in the limitless potential offered by the whole wide world, and still lust after a defanged, questionably redeemable vampire.

The spoon dropping seemed to have signaled the end of ice cream social. Quietly, Spike said, “Right, then. You wanna tell me what happened?”

At least said vampire was trying. So, “no” was probably not an acceptable answer. Even if she’d rather take a do-over going one-on-one with the monster they’d just slayed over sitting here, having her intervention sponsored by a vampire. Talking about it would make it real, and just the mere utterance of those words, in Mom’s kitchen (it would always be _Mom’s kitchen_ to Buffy), felt like an act of treason to her family and friends. Buffy couldn’t help but shoot a furtive glance at the upstairs.

“Nibblet’s asleep,” Spike said, instantly understanding. “They all are.” He indicated to her with his chin: her turn. Silently summoning the defendant to the stand. Or was it to the sentencing?

“I…” she started, her voice coming out small and shaky. Unslayer-like. Mom’s kitchen had always had this weird effect on her, causing her to regress to her teenage mentality. She wasn’t the one in charge here. That used to be Mom. Who was it now?

She cleared her throat, not that it did anything to dissolve the knot lodged in there. “It’s…not what you think.”

“What is it that you think I think?”

“That I lost the fight on purpose.”

“And you didn’t,” he said, unfolding his arms, leaning in across the counter, hope glinting in his eyes.

A deep breath. On the exhale, the words that’d been doing somersaults in her head tumbled out of their own volition.

“There was no master plan, okay? Living fully in the moment — ironic Zen girl, that’s me.” She chuckled, once, the humor already fading. “I can barely anticipate the next day. The demon was just _there_ , and — well, you met Lizard Face, all leathery and indestructible — punching it was like punching the world’s largest designer handbag stuffed full of bricks. And I know it was stupid to give up so easily, but then I thought… I thought…” Fighting the sting behind her eyes, she sniffed, trying to ease it.

“You thought you’d just won the lottery and landed yourself a one-way express ticket back to Heaven. Am I right?”

The casual reference to her deepest-guarded secret stunned her speechless. It seemed so presumptuous now to think that she’d automatically end up there again. Like, to get to the mall, head west on Fairview Ave. and take Highway 1. To get to Heaven, first, track down a carnivorous demon.

She averted her eyes, ashamed. “It was just there…”

Spike growled, pushed off the counter and took up pacing the length of the kitchen. Hands clenched, jaw tightened, expression menacing, he moved with intensified agitation, like he was out for blood. Then, abruptly, he came to a stop, turning his head to her. With forced composure, he asked, “How often?”

“What?” The question didn’t immediately make sense to her.

He seemed to have trouble elaborating, and even more trouble standing still. Rounding the corner of the kitchen counter, he stalked right up to her. “How often…is the option _just there_?”

Wait, he meant… Horrified, all she could do was shake her head.

He pointed a critical finger in the direction of the living room, nostrils flaring, chest heaving. It was a little bit scary.

“Should I worry about the weapons chest being _just there_? Plenty of sharp instruments in it to punch your ticket.” He seemed to notice that his raised hand was trembling in mid air, and withdrew it sharply. “You go patrolling in cemeteries counting on demons being _just there_? Well, you’d be right. You gonna let the first Tom, Dick or Harry of a beastie that’s _just there_ snuff out your light?”

That it’d almost happened tonight sent a shiver down her spine.

“No…” she whispered. Equally unbearable was the mixture of emotions layered on Spike’s face: pain, anger (for which he had _no right_ ), fear, despair. Even the bowl of ice cream, now no more than a melted mess, had lost its power to make her feel better. The world wavered, watery and uncertain. Then there were tears hitting the countertop.

She wanted the narration on her projected final moment to stop. Wanted to disown those tempting thoughts, ignore them, hoping that they’d die, starved of encouragement; not shine a light on them, count them, name them like inappropriate pets that’d followed her home and made a nest under her bed.

But Spike wasn’t satisfied. He was in her face now, clutching her arms with a vice-like grip, propping her up when all she wanted to do was crumple into a heap.

“What about magic? This house is packed to the rafters with spell books and supplies, courtesy of your two witchy friends. It reeks of power, vibrates with dark energy. Anything a sodding spell can do, another can reverse, yeah? Is magic ever _just there_?”

“Stop!” she begged. Twisting out of his hold to press her hands over her ears, she dug her fingernails into her scalp for grip, and shook her head violently to force out all the words lodged in there. The stories they told were lies, every single one of them. They were morbid. They were cruel. Just like those other voices.

Echoes of Spike’s words bounced around inside her head, poking at all the ugly ‘what-if’s to rouse them. Smelling blood they snarled and scratched and threw themselves at the metal cages until they bruised and bled. They’d recover; they always did. They’d outlast her.

She squeezed her eyes shut, wanting to shut down all her senses, shut out everything. Her elbows slipped on the smooth countertop; she almost hit her head on the edge. So she braced her arms against her chest instead, brought her head down, assuming the crash position. Would nothing short of oblivion save her from this bombardment —

A hand tucked at one of her arms, a muffled voice slipped through, sounding like a chant of her name. Then another hand was rubbing soothing circles on her back, counterclockwise as if trying to reverse time.

She concentrated on the singular sensation, allowing her breath to slow. Eventually, the world calmed, the voices subsiding. She uncovered her ears and opened her eyes.

“Buffy…” Spike was watching her intently. “What can I do to help?”

His gaze bored into her, making her feel like an insect under a magnifying glass. He likely meant well. No, she _knew_ he did. But at that moment, wiping away the wetness streaking down her face with the back of her hand, and seeing tears brimming his eyes and sympathy written all over his face, she couldn’t — she just couldn’t. She had not sunk low enough for a confused vampire with a rap sheet a century long to look at her like…like she needed _fixing_. As if she were a Sunnydale townie who’d lost her mind, who couldn’t handle the pressure of living on the Hellmouth. She was still the Slayer, goddamnit, even if she was currently crying her eyes out.

She shoved him away and got onto her feet.

“Do? Hasn’t everyone done enough?” She was deliberately twisting his words, twisting his offer to help into something ugly, but she didn’t care. Those feelings wanted out, and she didn’t give a damn about who deserved her rage. Nobody ever cared if she deserved all the pain that kept coming her way.

“Guess what, buddy, when someone’s _dead_ ” — she put as much vehemence into that word as she could — “it’s time to stop messing with them. Time to let them go. They’re past help. They’re beyond help.”

Hands firmly planted on his hips, as if to anchor them there, Spike let out a single wry laugh.

“Pithy speech. ‘Specially when given to the undead.” Refusing to back down, he continued, “Won’t deny it, Buffy. What they did was wrong. Interfering with life and death — no one should’ve done that. But as long as you’re alive, that’s something worth messing with, something worth holding onto.”

Darkly, he added, “And while we’re on the subject of suffering, have you any idea what the Little Bit went through after you jumped? Nearly destroyed her.”

“Oh, good. Feel free to lecture me on sisterly love and bring up past traumatic events. That’s gonna help,” she said sarcastically. She had to close her eyes to stop the deluge of memories rushing into her head. There were too many ghosts wearing her face.

A hand grasped her shoulder. A gesture of comfort, in contrast with his next words.

“Now you’re here, but you can’t wait to get back into the sodding grave. If you love your sister, then don’t choose to add _another_ traumatic event to her short life. Tell me, when you finally manage to catch your lucky break that you may cease to be, how long do you reckon Nibblet’s going to wait for her Big Sis to turn up before she gives up? A day? Two? What’s your wager? Would that be more or less time than it took you to give up on your new lease on life? Will your love spare her the pain of waiting for someone who’s never going to come through that door again? The uncertainty of not knowing if you’re dead or alive? Or being orphaned all over again at the tender age of fifteen? What sodding good would your love do her, after the witches perform a locator spell and track down your remains to a beast’s belly? Or as a newly installed trophy in a vamp nest?”

Crack! She backhanded him so hard that he bounced off the wall and struggled to get up. So hard that she had to shake her hand to get rid of the burn.

“That’s not fair!” she spat out through her teeth. “You _saw_ me turn my back on the whole world just to spare Dawn. You _saw_ me fight for her, die for her. The universe may not have noticed, but you were _there_. And now you have the audacity to question my love for Dawn? You want to lecture me on the sanctity of human life? News flash! You’re a vampire! How many lives have _you_ taken? How many futures have you stolen? Why don’t you figure that one out before you gasp and cry outrage over how I’m throwing my life away, or how I’m ruining my sister’s life, huh?”

Her body racked by violent waves of emotions long denied — rage battling with pain — she turned and escaped out the kitchen door. The crisp night air triggered a full-body shudder, and she hugged herself.

Lashing out in the middle of an argument and slamming doors? What was she, seventeen again? The thought petered out as a voice in her head spoke over it. _Run_ , it said. _See? This is not your home anymore. Run. Disappear into the night. Like you did last time._

Where would she go? Through the veil of tears, the world looked as distorted as the reflection from a funhouse mirror. She headed for the nearest source of light; she could follow the streetlamps wherever they led. Maybe even out of Sunnydale — this time for good.

_(To be continued...)_


	5. Chapter 5

“Buffy, wait!” From behind, a hand clasped around her wrist.

“Let me go!” She tried to free herself, pulling away without a backward glance. She didn’t want to face Spike; she couldn’t, not now. His words had stung because of the truth in them. In her desperate attempt to hold on to her memories of Heaven, to escape the now, she’d neglected to ask or even consider how Dawn had managed without her.

Her striking hand must’ve hit something critical, because for a brief moment, the hold on her wrist loosened. Then another arm locked around her waist and over her arms, pulling her back against the hard plane of his chest. She went wild, kicking and thrashing blindly, slamming her body into his again and again, threatening to topple both of them. There were no Slayer moves here, no clever strategy. It was brutal and sloppy and taxing, more cornered animal than disciplined fighter. But she didn’t care.

Just before she sapped her energy reserves, a howl pierced her ears, feral and guttural and chilling, and it took her a moment to recognize her own voice, the anguish calling out from somewhere deep inside her.

The end of the long note broke into sobs that were finally unrestrained and unabashed. It took a while for speech to return.

“You can’t save me!” she screamed. “You’re not even alive! You’re a vampire!”

“All true! Doesn’t mean I’m not going to try,” he said, his voice breaking, releasing a gasp of air that tickled her ear.

It threw her, the proximity of his voice, the desperation contained within that matched her own. She made a few more feeble attempts to free herself, but the real fight had left her body. Her argument preempted, she gulped the cool night air, trying to come up with her next rebuke. All she managed with her mind on a loop, was a lame refrain of, “You can’t save me. You can’t save me.”

“Right you are,” he mumbled into her hair, his chin brushing her shoulder. “Only you can.”

Before she could deny, he repeated for emphasis, “And you _can_.”

Could she, though? She wanted to shake her head, to refuse this daunting, new task added to her interminable to-do list, to free herself of this enormous responsibility. But it sounded so much like something Mom would say that she closed her eyes instead, and allowed herself to immerse in it, soaking up the comfort. It wasn’t real, but it was nice to pretend.

He must’ve noticed her body relax against his, because he said, “You won’t bolt? Gonna let go now. Don’t want to give chase barefoot, yeah?”

She looked down and blinked at her toes peeping out from pink fuzzy slippers, then at his sockless feet marked by a number of scrapes and cuts. What an odd image they made together, the Slayer and the Big Bad both out of their armour, looking almost domestic.

She nodded.

“Come on. Let’s get you home.”

* * *

It was late; the night lovely, dark and deep. These were the hours that belonged to her, to him, to other supernatural beings accustomed to the night. She could still disappear into it, outrun him if she wanted; and the night would take her, like black velvet swallowing a single drop of ink. And yet…

She turned her head to regard him, this strange vampire: A demon, surviving almost out of spite, rebelling against his own nature, who’d decided to fight his way out of that darkness. With so little chance for success, yet so much tenacity, he’d built his new life on the foundation of a single promise. How, then, could she, chosen descendant of the Slayer line, empowered above all in her generation, be so easily lost to the night?

The question lingered, past the neighbors’ dark houses, over the tall grass that whipped wildly in the wind, into the clearing of her yard. Not yet ready to go in, she dropped down onto the “thinking steps” of the back porch that’d seen her through some tough times.

He settled right next to her, shoulder to shoulder, apparently unwilling to take any chances. Mistaking her silence for accusation, he launched into an immediate apology. “Sorry, love. I bollixed it up a bit, didn’t I? Don’t exactly have a lot of experience convincing anyone to fight for their life, yeah? Start a sodding bar brawl or two, be your extra muscle, and I’m your vamp. Anything I can approach with fist and fangs. Matters that might require a delicate touch, not so much. All my fault — shouldn’t have pushed. Know you’re in a lot of pain. So much so that the only way out must appear to be —”

“I- I don’t want to die!” she said, stunned by the truth of it. “I just — I need the noise to go away. It follows me around, wears me down, rubs my nose in all the losses that have come to define my life until they’re all I see, all I am, all I could ever be. And I can _just_ bear this, this pathetic empty shell of an existence, clinging to what I can still lay claim to in this dimension: my sister, friends I can count on one hand, Mom’s house. The knowledge, the certainty, that eventually they’ll be taken away from me too, sooner or later…”

She looked up at the stars upon which the future was supposedly written, begging them for answers. “Does it ever stop?” Her voice cracked on the last word. Unsympathetic, as always, the stars gave no reply.

Instead of following her gaze skyward, he turned to her. Calloused fingers reached up and delicately stopped a tear in its tracks.

“Afraid I can’t answer that, Buffy. But the next time the call of the void is _just there_ , can I be _just there_ too? Until it goes away, or the fates intervene.”

He wanted to…? Taken back, she searched his eyes for meaning. They glowed, not the menacing gold of the demon, but a clear, soft blue of a man clinging stubbornly to hope.

When she didn’t speak, he continued more fervently, “Know I’m just a vampire. Redemption is not part of the package. Can’t change that. Know my fate’s not written in the stars. It’s buried in the fiery pits of Hell. But until they’ve got a vacancy for me, or until you kick me to the curb, figure the best use for someone like me is by your side, being your shadow. Deal?”

God, the things he said sometimes. She swallowed, except…

“It wouldn’t be fair to you. It wouldn’t be fair to me.”

“Right,” he said, looking at his toes. “Not your warden, guarding you against yourself. Not asking you to live for anyone else, either. Little Sis, the Scoobs.” He shook his head. “Nah. That’d be guilt, duty. Should be more than that tethering you to this bloody world. Should be what you want, yeah?”

He looked up suddenly, eyes sparkling like the stars above. “Hang on. I wager there are people infinitely more qualified to help you figure this out. Someone to talk to. Old Rupes, or… Anyone better than a soulless demon.”

She let out a dry laugh, but understood nonetheless. As Spike’s ideas went, this one was surprisingly level-headed.

“You should tell them about…where you were, though. Bottling it up inside? You think you’re protecting them. Thing is, the secret’s been eating you up from the inside.”

That one…she’d have to think about. She told him as much. Then a terrible thought crossed her mind. “Spike? What if the...thing doesn’t go away for a long time? What if it never does?”

He actually smiled, which, given her apprehension, seemed rather inappropriate, until he said —

“Well, then, neither will I. We’ll muddle through together. Don’t care how bloody long it’ll take. Don’t care if it comes to — _every night I save you_.”

Had she turned into a leaky pipe? Because the tears, this time of relief, had started again.

Despite Spike’s promises, she wasn’t fooled by the challenges that lay ahead. The whispers of impending doom hovered around her, holding their tongues for now, lying in wait for the next opportunity. But she’d heard her own voice too, strong as ever. And glancing at Spike, she knew she’d gained another voice she could trust, could wield as a weapon to cut through the noise.

Somehow, having a demon by her side gave her hope. If she could, as he said, inspire him to set foot on the path of redemption, why wouldn’t she be able to tame the demons inside her? She was the Slayer after all. His faith in her gave her the clarity to believe, to _know_ , that she would, in his words, “muddle through.”

Relaxed for the first time in a long time, she let her head fall to rest on his shoulder, and felt the safety in the arm that he raised to hold her closer. She didn’t want the sun to rise on this breakthrough of a night, but she smiled at the thought that when it did, she would finally get a good night’s sleep.

_(To be continued...)_


	6. Epilogue

She woke up the same way she always did these days: a blank alertness overtaking sleep, without the harsh interjection of an alarm clock whisking her into action, without the dying whispers of a dream urging her to stay. She stretched, smiling. A good night’s sleep really did wonders for the body, as did other things. And who had time to worry about the lack of dreams when you had life waiting for you this side of sleep?

She turned to face him, her vampire. How long had it been since he, at her urging, had finally packed up the crypt and moved in? Long enough that she’d stopped counting, but not so long that she took him for granted. Never long enough.

She reached up and touched the scar in that one brow (which he was stupidly sensitive about), traced those kissable lips. He really could sleep through anything. On second thought, she slid a knowing hand down his bare chest, caressing, lower, lower, until —

“You gonna follow through with that, right?” he mumbled, economically opening one eye to see what was the what. Ha. Couldn’t sleep through just _anything_ after all.

“What? Oh, sorry Spike, just stretching.” She started to get up. “Gotta go, can’t be late —”

A quick hand dragged her back by the waistband on her panties. She gave a convincing squeal, feigning swatting at his quick hands, which had proceeded to roam elsewhere.

“I’m serious!” she laughed, anything but. Instead she jumped into his arms and snuggled in closer.

In lieu of a reply, he peppered her with kisses that grew in ardor as they mapped out her body. A soft breath blew into her ear; blunt teeth skimmed over her pulsing jugular; a rough tongue flicked a hardening nipple. Buffy gasped. He knew how to work that mouth all right. In between turning her into putty he found the time to voice his grievances. “Bloody unethical work schedule, have you desert me at the crack of dawn.”

“Uhm, it’s” — it took her brain a moment to count the time — “eight o’clock already.”

“Practically _pre_ -dawn for a vampire.” He upped his protest. Next he’d be calling it midnight.

A hand was creeping between her legs. “Make it up to me good and proper, yeah?”

She giggled. “OK, if you’re quick.”

He looked affronted. “Fine. Only twice, then.”

There would still be good days and bad days. But when she thought about her life, she could see a long and winding path forward, leading to a future more tangible than a dream within a dream. And more importantly, with Spike by her side, she couldn’t wait to get there.

_(End)_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading! I hope I delivered on the promise of a happy ending, as painful as some of the story had to be.
> 
> I'd like to once again thank my extraordinary beta team: All4Spike, rahirah, DHW, il_mio_capitano, and freecat15, for their amazing talent and unwavering support throughout this story, for being totally unfazed by my tendency to choose difficult and sensitive topics! :P
> 
> All remaining errors are the result of my utter inability to stop tinkering with it (on and off for 5 months, at times not even telling my betas, because I was embarrassed that I wasn't happy with it, if that makes any sense).
> 
> I would love to hear from you if you stuck with me to the end. Let me know one thing/scene/sentence you liked. Tell me the good and the bad. That would just make my day! :) *hugs*
> 
> \-- Felicia

**Author's Note:**

> If you or someone you know happens to be going through a tough time, please know that there's hope, that it gets better, that there are people ready and willing to help.
> 
> In the U.S., confidential help for suicide prevention is available for free at the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline:  
> \- by phone: 1-800-273-8255  
> \- online chat: http://chat.suicidepreventionlifeline.org/GetHelp/LifelineChat.aspx
> 
> Please google "suicide prevention" for other sources, and local help.
> 
> You're not alone.


End file.
